The Trump administration has drawn a line in the sand.

It will not comply with a federal court order demanding due process for 252 Venezuelan migrants deported to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador last March under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act.

The Justice Department made that position clear in a new filing, setting up a collision course with U.S. District Judge James Boasberg and a near-certain return to the Supreme Court.

The case has emerged as a defining test of judicial power in Trump’s second term, pitting the executive branch’s immigration authority against the federal courts and their ability to enforce constitutional protections for illegal immigrant gang members.

The Venezuelans were flown to El Salvador in March 2025 despite an emergency order from Boasberg instructing the administration to halt the deportations and turn the planes around mid-flight. That decision triggered an eleven-month legal battle that reached the Supreme Court in April after months of wrangling in the lower courts. 

The justices ruled in the government’s favor on its authority to invoke the Alien Enemies Act, but Boasberg, an Obama appointee, doubled down in December, issuing another order directing the government to “facilitate” due process for the migrants who had already been deported. He presented two options: bring the men back to the United States for in-person hearings or facilitate hearings abroad that meet constitutional standards.

The Justice Department rejected both options in its Monday filing.

“In its filing Monday, the Justice Department argued again that the administration is powerless to return the Venezuelan migrants who were summarily deported last year,” reports Fox News. “The department rejected the notion that the U.S. could ‘facilitate’ due process proceedings for the migrants in question as previously ordered by the court, describing the options to do so as either legally impossible or practically unworkable due to national security concerns and the fragile political situation in Venezuela after the U.S. capture of Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro during a raid in Caracas last month.”

Justice Department lawyers argued that returning the migrants is legally impossible and presents national security risks. They cited strained diplomatic relations with Venezuela and the alleged gang ties of the deportees. The filing also dismissed the idea of holding hearings at the U.S. embassy in Caracas, citing the recent capture of Nicolás Maduro and the resulting political instability. The department further contended that the United States lacks jurisdiction to conduct habeas proceedings abroad and that attempting to do so would interfere with delicate diplomatic efforts.

The filing made clear that the administration believes it owes the migrants no additional due process. If Boasberg orders otherwise, Justice Department lawyers said they would immediately appeal and seek a stay from higher courts.

The department maintained that the president’s use of the Alien Enemies Act represents a national security decision outside the proper reach of judicial review.

“If, over defendants’ vehement legal and practical objections, the Court issues an injunction, defendants intend to immediately appeal, and will seek a stay pending appeal from this Court (and, if necessary, from the D.C. Circuit),” the Justice Department said in a statement.

Boasberg has attempted to dictate what the executive branch can do on immigration policy, an area where presidential authority is broad and judicial deference is typically the norm. Similar demands for court-mandated due process protocols were absent during the Obama administration, which deported immigrants in record numbers. During those years, the federal government shifted sharply from judicial removals to fast-track, nonjudicial proceedings. By 2012, 75 percent of illegals removed did not see a judge before being deported from the United States, amounting to 313,000 nonjudicial removals in a single fiscal year.

The Trump administration views the current legal fight as an extension of that same presidential authority enjoyed by Barack Obama. It sees Boasberg and other judges issuing immigration orders as rogue actors seeking to seize control of enforcement policy from the executive branch.

Authored by Jeff Louderback via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Three years have passed since a Norfolk Southern freight train carrying hazardous chemicals derailed in East Palestine, an eastern Ohio village near the Pennsylvania border.

On Feb. 3, the disaster’s third anniversary, The National Institutes of Health (NIH) held a grand opening ceremony for the East Palestine Train Derailment Health Research Program Office.

The office will serve as the home to a five-year, $10 million research initiative to assess and address the long-term health outcomes stemming from the derailment.

“NIH’s research hub offers the people of East Palestine a pathway to clear answers about their health they deserve,” said Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

“Everyone affected by this environmental disaster deserves access to independent, gold-standard science that puts their well-being first.”

Life in East Palestine abruptly changed around 9 p.m. on Feb. 3, 2023.

The crew of a Norfolk Southern Railway freight train carrying 151 cars saw smoke and fire, and realized that 38 cars had derailed.

The flammable, toxic chemicals in 11 derailed cars had ignited, with flames spreading to an additional 12 cars.

According to the National Transportation Safety Board, nine cars were carrying hazardous materials in addition to the 11 that derailed.

The hazardous chemicals, including vinyl chloride in some of the rail cars, began to spill onto the ground and into the air.

Vinyl chloride is used to make PVC pipes and other products.

The National Cancer Institute notes that the toxic chemical has been linked to cancers of the brain, lungs, blood, lymphatic system, and liver.

Vinyl chloride creates carbon monoxide and hydrogen chloride when it burns.

When the latter mixes with water, it generates hydrochloric acid, a corrosive substance that can burn the skin and eyes, and is toxic if inhaled.

Burning vinyl chloride also produces a small amount of phosgene gas, which was used as a chemical weapon on World War I battlefields.

As the fire continued, authorities on Feb. 6—fearing shrapnel from a major explosion—decided on a controlled detonation of five cars, which sent a massive cloud of black smoke into the sky.

Visible for miles, it was likened to the mushroom cloud caused by a nuclear weapon.

The government characterized it as a “controlled burn,” but residents said it was anything but controlled.

A dark cloud of chemical-filled smoke could be seen for miles, and debris landed on properties several miles away.

The train cars were ruptured in the detonation, and spilled the rest of their contents into a drainage ditch connecting to Sulphur Run, a stream that flows through the heart of East Palestine.

Before the burn, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine urged residents to evacuate a one-by-two-mile area surrounding East Palestine, which included parts of Ohio and Pennsylvania.

DeWine described the urgent evacuation as a “matter of life and death.”

Three days later, DeWine held a press conference announcing that the evacuation order had been lifted and residents could return to their homes.

Norfolk Southern trains resumed their routes through East Palestine, and federal and state officials said testing showed that the air and water were safe.

Fear and uncertainty remain among East Palestine residents.

Many locals complained about a toxic smell in the air, burning eyes, rashes, headaches, and other health issues.

These reports prompted concerns about potential long-term health effects, including “maternal and child health, as well as psychological, immunological, respiratory and cardiovascular health,” according to the NIH.

“This research program is designed to bring rigorous, independent science directly to the community,” NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya said.

“By establishing a local presence, we can better engage residents, support enrollment in studies, and ensure the research reflects the real experiences and concerns of the people affected.”

After the grand opening, a community meeting was held to outline the research program, explain how residents can enroll in studies, and provide people a chance to ask questions and share their experiences directly with researchers.

Jami Wallace was a lifelong East Palestine resident until the derailment.

She no longer lives in the community but has served as an outspoken advocate for people who have experienced health consequences from the disaster.

“I was diagnosed after the derailment with hypothyroidism. I’ve been diagnosed with asthma, I’ve been diagnosed with an adult chronic cough, I have a cyst on my right ovary that I have to have an operation on,” said Wallace, who is co-founder of the Chemically Impacted Communities Coalition.

“I get phone calls every day from people who are seeing cancers and thyroid disease, respiratory and neurological issues. You can’t tell me it’s not from those chemicals.

“I’ll fight Norfolk Southern, and I will fight my own government until we get accountability and we get justice.”

The Feb. 3 event included researchers and representatives from NIH’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, the University of Kentucky, the University of Pittsburgh, and Yale University.

“Since the beginning, we have seen the public experience respiratory issues, we’ve seen and heard about rashes, nose bleeds in children, eczema, reproductive health questions and concerns, so now we have a team of about sixteen scientists on our team that can help answer those questions for the public,” Dr. Erin Haynes of the University of Kentucky said.

“We have learned that the community is experiencing health conditions from the derailment, and we want to be able to give them answers to know if it is a true direct association.

“A lot of things are unanswered, but this large-scale study that we now have funding to do will really help answer those questions.”

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

With polling showing over 80 percent of Americans in favor of voter ID laws, it is hard to come up with reasons why you need an ID to board a plane but not vote in a federal election. That was particularly glaring this week when Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) required people to show an ID to attend his campaign events after opposing an ID requirement to vote. So if you want to hear Ossoff speak against voter ID, you will have to show your ID. Now Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) has a rather bizarre argument: the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, if passed, would likely violate the 19th Amendment to the Constitution.

CNN Host Kasie Hunt told Raskin that “Voter ID is supported by the majority of Americans. But there are Democrats on the Hill and you voted against this? Why not support voter ID?”

Raskin then had this curious response:

“… what’s wrong with the Save act? What’s wrong with it is that it might violate the 19th Amendment, which gives women the right to vote, because you’ve got to show that all of your different IDs match.

So if you’re a woman who’s gotten married and you’ve changed your name to your husband’s name, but you’re so now your current name is different from your name at birth.

Now you’ve got to go ahead and document that you need an affidavit explaining why. And why would we go to all of these, troubles in order to keep people from voting when none of the states that are actually running the elections are telling us that there’s any problem.”

In fact, under various voter ID laws, states can create systems to address issues such as different maiden names or name changes following a divorce, including requiring a standard attestation provided by the state.

Nothing in the SAVE Act requires birth certificates be brought to polling places. 

It allows for the use of a signed attestation supplied by the state.

As for identification, various forms are allowed:

The legislation would require documentation that shows an individual was born in the U.S., including either:

• An ID that complies with the REAL ID Act and indicates the holder is a citizen;

• A passport;

• A military ID card and military record of service that shows a person was born in the U.S.;

• A government-issued photo ID that shows the person’s place of birth was in the U.S.;

• Other forms of government-issued photo ID, if they’re accompanied by a birth certificate, comparable document or naturalization certificate.

Now, on the 19th Amendment, Raskin’s argument is simply ridiculous. Indeed, if this were credible, why has it not been used successfully against prior state voting ID laws? Rather than making this claim on CNN, it would be interesting for Raskin to try it in court once the SAVE Act passes.

It is unlikely to succeed because the 19th Amendment guarantees the right to vote, but, like all citizens, women can be asked to prove their eligibility to vote. The suggestion that requiring a signature on an attestation form is a barrier to voting is simply incredible.

The Nineteenth Amendment provides:

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Requiring proof of your identity neither denies nor abridges the right to vote. Indeed, for supporters of voter ID laws, it protects the right to vote by ensuring that only eligible voters are counted in elections.

Would requiring the REAL ID also violate constitutional rights like the right to travel or association for those with name changes? Of course not. The government may require basic identification for such transactions while creating reasonable methods of addressing name or address changes.

The claim of a 19th Amendment violation is spurious but par for the course in our current political environment. As with claims that democracy is about to die, these inflammatory claims are designed to distract voters who overwhelmingly support Voter ID. Democratic members are unified in opposing such laws. That is a debate that should be resolved on the merits, not meritless constitutional claims.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

Venture capitalist David Sacks has slammed The New York Times for its glaring failure to scrutinize Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn co-founder emerging as the top Silicon Valley figure in the explosive Jeffrey Epstein files.

In a scathing segment on the All-In Podcast, Sacks highlighted how the establishment media targets right-leaning tech moguls while giving a free pass to left-wing donors deeply entangled with Epstein.

“Brad, you speak about the corruption of power centers. I think a major one has to be The New York Times,” Sacks urged.

David Sacks Asks Why the New York Times is Protecting Reid Hoffman ?

“The number one person in the Epstein files from Silicon Valley which is Reid Hoffman … stayed at not just the island, but the townhouse and the New Mexico ranch.”

“The New York Times clearly has a list of… pic.twitter.com/NJzwdrcnbg

— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) February 7, 2026

“The number-one person in the Epstein files from Silicon Valley which is Reid Hoffman mentioned 2,600 times had a multiyear relationship with Epstein and they call each other very good friends. They did deals together,” Sacks explained.

He continued, “Reid stayed at the trifecta which is not just the island but the townhouse and the New Mexico ranch. And if you’re gonna write about Mark Zuckerberg organize that famous dinner how can you not mention that as the root of Epstein’s involvement in Silicon Valley?”

“And yet Reid just gets a mentioned in one sentence of article along with several other people,” Sacks stressed.

He accused the Times of selective outrage, noting “It is crazy. I mean The New York Times clearly has a list people they consider approved targets. They are all right coded people like Elon or Peter Thiel.”

“And they become targets but the people who have donated hundreds millions dollars to the Democrat Party and have paid for dirty tricks against Trump, they basically are spared. Honestly this is just emblematic of the whole institutional rot in a distrust in the country right there,” Sacks explained.

“Part of the cabal, it’s part of the institutions that people are losing faith in, and you know Epstein was a scumbag and the fact of matter is we’re not seeing equal play on both sides,” Sacks further urged.

The remarks come amid fresh revelations from the Justice Department’s massive Epstein document dump, which includes emails showing Hoffman’s ongoing interactions with the convicted sex offender long after his 2008 plea deal.

Newly unsealed emails reveal Hoffman discussing visits to Epstein’s notorious private island, his New Mexico ranch, and his New York apartment. One 2015 message has Epstein boasting about a “wild dinner” with Hoffman, Mark Zuckerberg, and others.

?BREAKING: Newly released Jeffrey Epstein emails reveal LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman discussing visits to Epstein’s private island, New Mexico ranch, and New York apartment.

“Reid will spend the night at 71st”

“Reid Hoffman will go to the ranch for the weekend”

“Jeffrey will… pic.twitter.com/eRGEecI2KG

— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) January 30, 2026

A 2012 email to Epstein referred to Reid Hoffman, who founded LinkedIn, as the “fatty at LinkedIn.”

Follow: @AFpost pic.twitter.com/cQ2LsVLmUS

— AF Post (@AFpost) February 2, 2026

The Free Beacon detailed how Hoffman maintained the relationship years after claiming it ended, including Skype calls, sushi meetings, and phone dates—all while Epstein name-dropped tech elites to lure investments.

Democratic megadonor and LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman issued a mea culpa late Tuesday, acknowledging that he met and interacted with Jeffrey Epstein long after he said his relationship with the disgraced pedophile stopped.

It came after a Free Beacon report spotlighted… pic.twitter.com/K5ysSuW04g

— Washington Free Beacon (@FreeBeacon) February 5, 2026

Hoffman denies any wrongdoing.

I only knew Jeffrey Epstein because of a fundraising relationship with MIT, which I very much regret. In 2019 I told Axios the last meeting I had with him was in 2015 but I was mistaken, as according to calendar entries I have become aware there were additional fundraising…

— Reid Hoffman (@reidhoffman) February 4, 2026

This selective media coverage underscores a broader pattern where globalist insiders and Democrat funders evade accountability, while critics of the establishment face relentless attacks.

This is how I knew so long ago that Reid Hoffman went to Epstein’s island.

Epstein used Reid being there to try to get me to go, not realizing that it would have the opposite effect ? pic.twitter.com/zrOIq4gWaR

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 1, 2026

The following thread (click through) details the extent of the relationship between Epstein and Hoffman.

1/ Reid Hoffman introduced Jeffrey Epstein to Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel, and Elon Musk

In May 2014, Jeffrey Epstein emailed his assistant:

“Ask Reid Hoffman’s secretary for Thiel’s phone number as we were supposed to meet in New York on Monday.”

In July 2015, Hoffman… pic.twitter.com/kzKTeVW2VE

— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) January 30, 2026

As the Epstein saga unravels, it exposes how power protects its own, fueling public distrust in institutions that prioritize partisan loyalty over truth.

Our earlier report detailed House Oversight Chairman James Comer’s push to question Bill Gates on his Epstein ties, amid bipartisan demands for answers. This aligns with Sacks’ critique of uneven scrutiny on elite figures.

We also covered Hillary Clinton’s attempt to turn her deposition into a public spectacle, dodging private grilling.

A further chilling email we covered hinted at depopulation discussions between Epstein and Gates, interpreted by some as elite scheming.

And then there are the tunnels. What was going on with the tunnels?

Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch. Follow us on X @ModernityNews.

A little more than a day after The Wall Street Journal reported that Elon Musk had rejiggered SpaceX’s near-term space roadmap, pivoting from a Mars-first to now prioritizing the Moon, Musk has now effectively confirmed the reporting.

“Time to go back to the Moon at scale,” Musk wrote on X early Sunday morning.

Time to go back to the Moon at scale https://t.co/rFjaenmQZd

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 8, 2026

X user Autism Capital hilariously responded to Musk with “Back”…

“Back” pic.twitter.com/h1W3ilKx6k

— Autism Capital 🧩 (@AutismCapital) February 8, 2026

Late Friday evening, WSJ cited sources who said Musk had pushed back the planned late-year Mars mission, with SpaceX now targeting a Starship launch to the Moon in March 2027.

The space pivot comes after SpaceX acquired Musk’s AI company, xAI, last week, combining his rocket and satellite business with his artificial intelligence startup to accelerate plans for a fleet of low-Earth-orbit data centers.

The deal gives SpaceX a valuation of $1 trillion, and xAI a value of $250 billion. The combined company’s valuation of $1.25 trillion was announced to employees in a memo on Monday, with an IPO slated for later this year that could raise as much as $50 billion.

Even though Musk previously dismissed the moon as a “distraction” and argued for Mars first, it appears NASA may have nudged him, especially as Jeff Bezos’s rocket company, Blue Origin, has paused space tourism launches to focus on the moon.

Kardashev II civilization or bust.

Starship will get us to the Moon and Mars. pic.twitter.com/L9vhMOdDPK

— Tesla Owners Silicon Valley (@teslaownersSV) February 7, 2026

In a memo earlier last week, Musk told employees that the pivot will pave the way for the U.S. to construct a permanent base on the moon.

“The capabilities we unlock by making space-based data centers a reality will fund and enable self-growing bases on the moon, an entire civilization on Mars, and ultimately expansion to the universe,” he said.

Musk expanded on the idea of space-based data centers last week in an eye-opening conversation with tech podcaster and researcher Dwarkesh Patel, saying: “In 36 months, the cheapest place to put AI will be space.”

“Solar cells are already very cheap. They’re farcically cheap. I think solar cells in China are around 25-30 cents per watt. It’s absurdly cheap. Now put it in space, and it’s five times cheaper. In fact, it’s not five times  cheaper, it’s 10 times cheaper   because you don’t need any batteries. So the moment your cost of access to space becomes low, by far the cheapest and most scalable way to generate tokens is space,” Musk told Patel.

All this upcoming launch activity and the return to the moon will certainly drive a new space investing theme once the SpaceX IPO debuts. We have outlined multiple ways to profit from the space industry buildout, from low Earth orbit to lunar operations and beyond (see here, here, and here).

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Almost 2,000 truckers deemed to be unqualified to drive on U.S. roads have been removed, with several arrested and many vehicles put out of service, the Department of Transportation (DOT) said in a Feb. 6 statement.

The action came as part of the first wave of Operation SafeDRIVE, a “high-visibility, multi-state enforcement and education effort focused on reducing dangerous driving behaviors, ensuring drivers are properly qualified, and addressing unsafe drivers and vehicles on the nation’s roadways,” the department said.

Inspectors from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration teamed up with law enforcement partners in 26 states and the District of Columbia in the three-day effort, Jan. 13 to 15, carrying out “targeted enforcement actions along major freight corridors and other high-risk locations.”

The operation resulted in 8,215 inspections, with 56 truckers being arrested for driving under the influence and illegally being present in the United States, DOT said. A total of 1,231 vehicles were put out of service.

Out of the 2,000 truckers, 704 were removed from service, including nearly 500 for violating English proficiency standards. The removal of these 500 truckers follows the Trump administration’s implementation of English language proficiency requirements for truck drivers.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order in March designating English as the official language of the United States. In April, he signed another executive order that instructed Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy to remove commercial truck drivers failing English proficiency tests.

Proficiency in English should be a “non-negotiable safety requirement for professional drivers,” Trump wrote in the order. “They should be able to read and understand traffic signs, communicate with traffic safety, border patrol, agricultural checkpoints, and cargo weight-limit station officers.”

Derek D. Barrs, administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, said the recent operation was about safety of the trucking sector. When drivers ignore rules or operate without having proper qualifications, they put lives at risk, he said.

Duffy said Operation SafeDRIVE “shows what happens when we work together with our law enforcement partners to pull unqualified drivers and vehicles off American roads.”

“We need a whole-of-government approach to ensure the Trump administration’s strong standards of safety are in place to protect American families and reduce road accidents.”

Crackdown on Unqualified Truckers

The crackdown on unqualified truck drivers comes amid incidents of illegal immigrants being involved in truck-related accidents.

In August, an illegal immigrant truck driver was accused of causing a crash that killed three people in Florida. In September, another illegal immigrant was arrested after a truck he drove caused an accident that resulted in a 5-year-old girl suffering critical injuries.

This month, Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested an illegal immigrant from Kyrgyzstan after his truck hit a van in a head-on collision that killed four people in Indiana. He had obtained a commercial driver’s license in Pennsylvania, the Department of Homeland Security said in a Feb. 5 statement.

The Trump administration’s actions against unqualified drivers in the trucking industry has faced legal challenges.

In December, the state of California sued the administration after DOT decided to withhold $33 million in federal funding over the state allegedly failing to comply with the English proficiency requirement for truckers.

California argued in the lawsuit that it does enforce English-language rules for commercial drivers, accusing the DOT action of being “arbitrary and capricious, an abuse of discretion, and contrary to law; imperils the safety of all persons driving in California; and threatens to wreak significant economic damage.”

In June, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration launched a nationwide review that discovered widespread noncompliance regarding the issuing of commercial driver’s licenses across several states, especially California, Colorado, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, and Washington.

In September, Duffy announced emergency action to restrict the eligibility of foreign-domiciled drivers to obtain these licenses.

“Licenses to operate a massive, 80,000-pound truck are being issued to dangerous foreign drivers—oftentimes illegally,” Duffy said.

More recently, DOT announced on Jan. 8 that a review of North Carolina’s nondomiciled commercial driver’s licenses by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration found that 54 percent were issued illegally. Duffy called this a dangerous situation.

“I’m calling on state leadership to immediately remove these dangerous drivers from our roads and clean up their system,” he said.

San Francisco officials say they have shut down or taken legal action against nine convenience stores in the Tenderloin after uncovering illegal gambling rooms, drug operations, and fencing schemes, according to the NY Post. City Attorney David Chiu said the shops had become centers of “drug-driven lawlessness” and helped sell stolen goods to shady customers.

“These convenience stores were magnets for drug activity, and, in some cases, the stores were selling illegal drugs themselves,” Chiu said, adding that his office has targeted the businesses over the past 18 months. In one case, police searching a smoke shop found five gambling machines, more than $17,000 in cash, gun magazines, and cannabis products.

The Post writes that another raid in 2025 revealed nearly 51 grams of meth hidden under a shelf, hundreds of glass pipes, electronic gambling machines, thousands of dollars in cash, and stolen merchandise. Officials say such discoveries highlight how some neighborhood shops had turned into underground casinos and drug hubs.

The crackdown is linked to a nighttime safety ordinance passed in July 2024. The pilot program restricts certain stores in high-crime areas from operating between midnight and 5 a.m. Businesses that break the rule can be fined up to $1,000 or face lawsuits. City leaders now want to extend the program and expand it to other troubled neighborhoods.

Supervisor Matt Dorsey said the policy gives residents a “cooling-off period” that discourages illegal behavior. Police Chief Derrick Lew also welcomed the effort, saying officers will remain “relentless” in targeting illegal drug markets.

Several other stores were forced out after landlords were alerted to unlawful activity, according to the city attorney’s office. Officials argue that closing these problem locations is a key step toward improving safety in one of San Francisco’s most troubled districts.

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said on Feb. 6 that the Pentagon will cut all academic ties with Harvard University as the institution “no longer meets the needs of the War Department or the military services.”

Hegseth said the Pentagon would discontinue graduate-level professional military education, fellowships, and certificate programs with the Ivy League school beginning in the 2026-27 academic year for active duty service members.

This policy will apply to service members enrolling in future courses, while military personnel already enrolled at Harvard will still be allowed to finish their courses, according to the Pentagon chief.

“For too long, this department has sent our best and brightest officers to Harvard, hoping the university would better understand and appreciate our warrior class,” he said in a statement.

“Instead, too many of our officers came back looking too much like Harvard — heads full of globalist and radical ideologies that do not improve our fighting ranks.”

Hegseth said Harvard is no longer a welcoming institution for military personnel, citing its partnership with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) on campus research programs and a campus culture he said enabled attacks on Jewish students and “promotes discrimination based on race in violation of Supreme Court decisions.”

In a separate post on X, Hegseth said the institution was promoting “woke” ideology, which goes against the department’s values.

File this under: LONG OVERDUE

The @DeptWar is formally ending ALL Professional Military Education, fellowships, and certificate programs with Harvard University.

Harvard is woke; The War Department is not. pic.twitter.com/0kpsvivtsQ

— Secretary of War Pete Hegseth (@SecWar) February 6, 2026

The Pentagon and military services also will evaluate similar relationships with other Ivy League schools and civilian universities in the coming weeks, according to the statement.

“The goal is to determine whether or not they actually deliver cost-effective strategic education for future senior leaders when compared to, say, public universities and our military graduate programs,” Hegseth said.

The Epoch Times has reached out to Harvard for comment and did not receive a response by publication time.

Earlier this week, President Donald Trump said his administration would demand Harvard pay $1 billion in damages, accusing the university of being “strongly antisemitic.”

“Harvard has been, for a long time, behaving very badly! They wanted to do a convoluted job training concept, but it was turned down in that it was wholly inadequate and would not have been, in our opinion, successful,” he wrote on Truth Social.

The Trump administration has attempted to freeze billions of dollars in federal funding from Harvard following an investigation into diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and claims of anti-Semitism in higher education last year. The White House said in April 2025 that Harvard failed to protect its students from harassment and violence on campus.

Harvard President Alan Garber filed a lawsuit against the administration in April 2025, seeking to restore $2.2 billion in grants and contracts withheld by the government.

A federal judge later reversed the funding freeze, ruling that the government violated the First Amendment through its efforts to combat anti-Semitism. The Justice Department appealed the decision in December 2025.

Russian spacecraft have reportedly been intercepting the communications of at least a dozen high-value European satellites, according to EU security officials, in the latest Ukraine-related ‘scare’ by Moscow. However, any information gleaned would be from communications that the satellite operators failed to encrypt. 

Officials told the Financial Times that such interceptions risk exposing sensitive data and could even give Russia the ability to interfere with satellite trajectories or even force them offline entirely.

“Two Russian satellites ‘Luch-1’ and ‘Luch-2’ repeatedly approached European communication satellites and could intercept information from at least ten key geostationary satellites located over Europe,” the report says.

It was already widely reported that Russian spacecraft have increasingly shadowed European satellites in recent years, tracking them closely as tensions with the West spiraled related to Ukraine – a trend also highlighting how space is fast becoming the next battlefield.

Also, this isn’t the first time some very specific allegations have been publicly made, as last year German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Russian Luch Olymp surveillance satellites were trailing Germany’s Intelsat satellites, which are also used by other governments.

The Russian craft are said to linger near their targets for weeks at a time, with Luch-2 in particular being known to have approached at least 17 satellites.

German officials have bluntly alleged that these Russian satellites are not benign or for civilian use, but clearly are in the “signals intelligence business”.

In the background, there are fears that Ukraine and its European backers are far outmatched by Russia’s space capabilities. One publication called this a wake-up call:

Russia, they found, could draw on a fleet of roughly 200 satellites with military utility. Ukraine had just one. The disparity underlined not only Kyiv’s vulnerability in the early stages of the war, but a broader strategic gap that now occupies European policymakers: in modern conflict, space-based intelligence isn’t a luxury but a prerequisite for survival. 

Since then, Ukraine has ramped up its domestic capability and secured access to images from commercial and allied constellations.

The lesson hasn’t been lost on Brussels.The EU’s commissioner for defense and space, Andrius Kubilius, has called for a “big bang” approach to space, arguing that investments must match those of more traditional defense priorities. 

Very early in the conflict the Kremlin had warned that non-military satellites used by Ukraine “constitute indirect involvement in military conflicts” – warning that they could eventually be targeted. 

At that early phase (in 2022) the deputy chief of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s arms control and nonproliferation department, Konstantin Vorontsov, has said “Quasi-civilian infrastructure could be a legitimate target for retaliation.“

Authored by Thomas Brooke via Remix News,

A German non-governmental organization that receives substantial funding from the European Union, as well as the German and Dutch governments, has filed a lawsuit seeking access to social media platform X’s data related to Hungary’s upcoming parliamentary elections.

Berlin-based Democracy Reporting International (DRI) has taken legal action in Germany against the social media giant, demanding access to platform data under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA). The group says the data is necessary to study potential disinformation and interference surrounding Hungary’s parliamentary elections scheduled for April 12.

Another German NGO, the Society for Civil Rights (Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte, GFF), and law firm Hausfeld Rechtsanwälte are also parties to the lawsuit.

According to court filings reported by EUObserver, this is the second legal action brought by the same plaintiffs against X in Germany, after a previous case seeking access to platform data around Germany’s 2025 snap federal election.

With campaigning intensifying ahead of Hungary’s April vote, the legal battle over platform data now adds another layer to an already charged political environment, one in which the question of who defines and defends democratic legitimacy remains deeply contested across Europe.

Under the DSA, very large online platforms are required to provide researchers access to data when studies concern systemic risks to the European Union, including election integrity. DRI argues that X has failed to comply with that obligation, saying repeated requests for data access have been rejected.

Critics, however, argue that the DSA is being used as a vehicle by the European Commission and those it funds to control the narrative during critical election cycles, a claim amplified by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee in its bombshell report published on Feb. 3.

X has previously argued that broad data access risks infringing user privacy and free expression, and has also challenged whether German courts have jurisdiction over disputes involving the platform, whose European headquarters are located in Ireland.

The new lawsuit comes as Hungary prepares for what analysts describe as one of the most competitive elections in recent years, with Prime Minister Viktor Orbán facing a consolidated opposition campaign amid continuing tensions between Budapest and Brussels over rule-of-law disputes, migration policy, and EU governance.

Orbán has repeatedly accused EU institutions of attempting to influence domestic Hungarian politics. Responding to criticism over election conditions earlier this week, he wrote on social media, “Keep your hands off our elections! Decisions about Hungary’s future belong to Hungarians alone. Foreign meddling will not be tolerated.”

🚨The EU Censorship Files, Part II

For more than a year, the Committee has been warning that European censorship laws threaten U.S. free speech online.

Now, we have proof: Big Tech is censoring Americans’ speech in the U.S., including true information, to comply with Europe’s… pic.twitter.com/Fg0gxzoTxD

— House Judiciary GOP 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 (@JudiciaryGOP) February 3, 2026

His remarks followed a recent report by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, which argued that European authorities have used regulatory pressure and cooperation with digital platforms in ways that affected political debate in at least eight EU member states since the introduction of the DSA in 2023.

Entries in Germany’s Bundestag Lobby Register reveal that DRI received substantial public grants during the 2024 fiscal year, including funding from the European Commission totaling approximately €3.9 million, as well as roughly €1.9 million from Germany’s Federal Foreign Office and associated agencies, and approximately €880,000 from the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs for “democracy-related projects” abroad.

GFF, DRI’s co-plaintiff, has also received support from EU-funded initiatives and participates in projects financed under various European civil society and rights programs, according to a written response by the European Commission to a parliamentary question in 2025.

“The Digital Freedom Fund is the beneficiary of an EU grant for the implementation of project DIGIRISE, ‘Developing Information, Guidance, and Interconnectedness for (Charter) Rights Integration in Strategies for Enforcement,” it wrote. The funding amount was not disclosed.

Critics argue that litigation seeking access to election-related data by organizations financed in part by European institutions risks creating the perception of external supervision over national political processes, particularly in countries already engaged in disputes with Brussels.

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